The Language-Learning Thread

Kinetic wrote:

John Galt wrote:I appear to be reaching a bit of a rut with regards to my Chinese learning. My main problem is my vocabulary but I'm finding it difficult to improve this via any means other than simply remembering words using flashcards and the likes. Although I've been able to find some good resources for reading at my level, any new words that I do pick up through these I tend to just forget unless I come across them in subsequent passages.

I'm guessing that this is a common problem when you reach a level in a language where it's a lack of vocabulary holding you back, so does anyone who has experienced this have any tips at all?

Unless you use it regularly in conversation, I've found that vocab tends to dwindle quite quickly. I've been out of Taiwan for about 6 months now and am coming to applying for some Chinese-related jobs having not really used my Chinese at all since coming back to the UK. Suffice to say, its pretty damned rusty. I've started reading the Chinese language version of BBC news aswell as some other news/politics blogs and watching some more Chinese films and TV shows and it's all coming back fairly quickly. There's loads on the internet, John, I'd recommend finding something you're interested in and reading/watching that. The obvious downside of reading the news is that any vocab you learn if fairly non-applicable to daily life, I'd say if you're looking for conversational vocab, research some TV shows and films and watch them on youku.

I'll try and have a think of some websites that might be good for you to check out later pal.

Cheers bro. I think the problem I'm having is that I'm somewhere in between text book study and just pure language immersion. I find the majority of text books or similar sources available are too basic for what I want, yet when I've tried watching Chinese TV shows or reading Chinese text aimed at native readers I find it's too difficult for me to pick anything up.

John Galt wrote:

Kinetic wrote:

John Galt wrote:I appear to be reaching a bit of a rut with regards to my Chinese learning. My main problem is my vocabulary but I'm finding it difficult to improve this via any means other than simply remembering words using flashcards and the likes. Although I've been able to find some good resources for reading at my level, any new words that I do pick up through these I tend to just forget unless I come across them in subsequent passages.

I'm guessing that this is a common problem when you reach a level in a language where it's a lack of vocabulary holding you back, so does anyone who has experienced this have any tips at all?

Unless you use it regularly in conversation, I've found that vocab tends to dwindle quite quickly. I've been out of Taiwan for about 6 months now and am coming to applying for some Chinese-related jobs having not really used my Chinese at all since coming back to the UK. Suffice to say, its pretty damned rusty. I've started reading the Chinese language version of BBC news aswell as some other news/politics blogs and watching some more Chinese films and TV shows and it's all coming back fairly quickly. There's loads on the internet, John, I'd recommend finding something you're interested in and reading/watching that. The obvious downside of reading the news is that any vocab you learn if fairly non-applicable to daily life, I'd say if you're looking for conversational vocab, research some TV shows and films and watch them on youku.

I'll try and have a think of some websites that might be good for you to check out later pal.

Cheers bro. I think the problem I'm having is that I'm somewhere in between text book study and just pure language immersion. I find the majority of text books or similar sources available are too basic for what I want, yet when I've tried watching Chinese TV shows or reading Chinese text aimed at native readers I find it's too difficult for me to pick anything up.

I'd recommend checking out PPStream and seeing if there's any TV soaps (they're generally pretty conversational in tone) that take your fancy and then checking them out on youku or Youtube (PPStream is a real strawberry floater). Try checking out Black and White 痞子英雄 for starters, maybe. It's a Taiwanese cop show that's pretty entertaining (it starts off kinda serious and them degenerates into some bat-shit crazy storylines) and has loads of fit Taiwanese girls in it and its all up on Youtube.

In terms of reading, maybe try and find an asian bookstore and pick up some kids books, or check out some news websites. Chinasmack is a great website for pop-culture, netizen reactions and generally mental news stories that has English translations of Chinese netizens' reactions and if you hover your mouse over each comment it'll give the original Chinese. Good for seeing how young people actually write and you'll learn some decent and useable vocab. Also, if you haven't already, install 'Zhonwen' (Chrome) or 'Pera-pera Kun' (Firefox) translators. They are a life saver!

Rudolphin wrote:Completely overlooked this thread. I did JET for 3 years if anyone has any questions on the application process or what happens when you get out there.

Anyway, just started learning Spanish through a teach-yourself course. If it works out I might consider getting some proper lessons. Are there any official Spanish learning councils/board in the UK? Anything that officially recognises teaching institutions and does exams, something like that?

With regards to JET, how tough was the interview? I know you get drilled by three people and possibly asked to do a quick lesson demonstration but I've heard mixed reports on the friendliness of the interviewers. Any tips for those of us who get an interview this month? Also, did you have a lot of responsibility during your years with JET or were you just a human tape recorder? (I know "ESSID" but I've heard reports of people just being used as human tape recorders by the teacher and it really puts me off).

FAO G-Rat et al: I checked the JET forums and the first person to get their interview invitation letter last year received it on the 6th Jan - that's today!

Pacman wrote:

Rudolphin wrote:Completely overlooked this thread. I did JET for 3 years if anyone has any questions on the application process or what happens when you get out there.

Anyway, just started learning Spanish through a teach-yourself course. If it works out I might consider getting some proper lessons. Are there any official Spanish learning councils/board in the UK? Anything that officially recognises teaching institutions and does exams, something like that?

With regards to JET, how tough was the interview? I know you get drilled by three people and possibly asked to do a quick lesson demonstration but I've heard mixed reports on the friendliness of the interviewers. Any tips for those of us who get an interview this month? Also, did you have a lot of responsibility during your years with JET or were you just a human tape recorder? (I know "ESSID" but I've heard reports of people just being used as human tape recorders by the teacher and it really puts me off).

FAO G-Rat et al: I checked the JET forums and the first person to get their interview invitation letter last year received it on the 6th Jan - that's today!

My interview was a good-cop, bad-cop routine, with the two British guys (a man and a woman) being lovely and the Japanese lady being quite cold. I didn't find it too hard at all: they asked me why I was interested in Japan, to sum up some traits of the culture I admired, a few factual questions (all of which I got wrong ) and what I could bring to the programme. I didn't have to do a lesson plan demo, but I tossed out a few ideas anyway.

If I was to have a hitlist of things to do:

- SMILE! I genuinely think this is why I got the job. Try and look relaxed and enthusiastic.
- Mention props and games and have examples. They love that gooseberry fool. Look up the rules of Fruit Basket! Drop that in and they'll love you.
- Have at least one Japanese celeb/actor you can talk about. I mentioned Takeshi Kitano and Hayao Miyazaki and that went down really well.
- Don't stereotype.

Above all, try and get your love of the culture across as much as your desire to teach.

While over there I was put in 3 Senior High Schools (15-18 year olds), a relatively rare position nowadays. The chances are that you'll be teaching Junior High School kids from 4-15 and will be at a great many schools working out of a central board of education (BOE). Each school will treat you differently: I had friends who were tape recorders, and others who planned the entire curriculum. It's pot-luck really.

Where are you hoping to be placed? I was in Kumamoto prefecture on Kyushu and I strawberry floating loved it. 3 of the best years of my life.

Kinetic wrote:

John Galt wrote:

Kinetic wrote:

John Galt wrote:I appear to be reaching a bit of a rut with regards to my Chinese learning. My main problem is my vocabulary but I'm finding it difficult to improve this via any means other than simply remembering words using flashcards and the likes. Although I've been able to find some good resources for reading at my level, any new words that I do pick up through these I tend to just forget unless I come across them in subsequent passages.

I'm guessing that this is a common problem when you reach a level in a language where it's a lack of vocabulary holding you back, so does anyone who has experienced this have any tips at all?

Unless you use it regularly in conversation, I've found that vocab tends to dwindle quite quickly. I've been out of Taiwan for about 6 months now and am coming to applying for some Chinese-related jobs having not really used my Chinese at all since coming back to the UK. Suffice to say, its pretty damned rusty. I've started reading the Chinese language version of BBC news aswell as some other news/politics blogs and watching some more Chinese films and TV shows and it's all coming back fairly quickly. There's loads on the internet, John, I'd recommend finding something you're interested in and reading/watching that. The obvious downside of reading the news is that any vocab you learn if fairly non-applicable to daily life, I'd say if you're looking for conversational vocab, research some TV shows and films and watch them on youku.

I'll try and have a think of some websites that might be good for you to check out later pal.

Cheers bro. I think the problem I'm having is that I'm somewhere in between text book study and just pure language immersion. I find the majority of text books or similar sources available are too basic for what I want, yet when I've tried watching Chinese TV shows or reading Chinese text aimed at native readers I find it's too difficult for me to pick anything up.

I'd recommend checking out PPStream and seeing if there's any TV soaps (they're generally pretty conversational in tone) that take your fancy and then checking them out on youku or Youtube (PPStream is a real strawberry floater). Try checking out Black and White 痞子英雄 for starters, maybe. It's a Taiwanese cop show that's pretty entertaining (it starts off kinda serious and them degenerates into some bat-shit crazy storylines) and has loads of fit Taiwanese girls in it and its all up on Youtube.

In terms of reading, maybe try and find an asian bookstore and pick up some kids books, or check out some news websites. Chinasmack is a great website for pop-culture, netizen reactions and generally mental news stories that has English translations of Chinese netizens' reactions and if you hover your mouse over each comment it'll give the original Chinese. Good for seeing how young people actually write and you'll learn some decent and useable vocab. Also, if you haven't already, install 'Zhonwen' (Chrome) or 'Pera-pera Kun' (Firefox) translators. They are a life saver!

Thanks again. I downloaded Pera-Pera Kun a few months ago and it has been extremely useful; those of you studying Japanese might also want to take a look at it as there's a Japanese version too.

Tafdolphin wrote:

Pacman wrote:

Rudolphin wrote:Completely overlooked this thread. I did JET for 3 years if anyone has any questions on the application process or what happens when you get out there.

Anyway, just started learning Spanish through a teach-yourself course. If it works out I might consider getting some proper lessons. Are there any official Spanish learning councils/board in the UK? Anything that officially recognises teaching institutions and does exams, something like that?

With regards to JET, how tough was the interview? I know you get drilled by three people and possibly asked to do a quick lesson demonstration but I've heard mixed reports on the friendliness of the interviewers. Any tips for those of us who get an interview this month? Also, did you have a lot of responsibility during your years with JET or were you just a human tape recorder? (I know "ESSID" but I've heard reports of people just being used as human tape recorders by the teacher and it really puts me off).

FAO G-Rat et al: I checked the JET forums and the first person to get their interview invitation letter last year received it on the 6th Jan - that's today!

My interview was a good-cop, bad-cop routine, with the two British guys (a man and a woman) being lovely and the Japanese lady being quite cold. I didn't find it too hard at all: they asked me why I was interested in Japan, to sum up some traits of the culture I admired, a few factual questions (all of which I got wrong ) and what I could bring to the programme. I didn't have to do a lesson plan demo, but I tossed out a few ideas anyway.

If I was to have a hitlist of things to do:

- SMILE! I genuinely think this is why I got the job. Try and look relaxed and enthusiastic.
- Mention props and games and have examples. They love that gooseberry fool. Look up the rules of Fruit Basket! Drop that in and they'll love you.
- Have at least one Japanese celeb/actor you can talk about. I mentioned Takeshi Kitano and Hayao Miyazaki and that went down really well.
- Don't stereotype.

Above all, try and get your love of the culture across as much as your desire to teach.

While over there I was put in 3 Senior High Schools (15-18 year olds), a relatively rare position nowadays. The chances are that you'll be teaching Junior High School kids from 4-15 and will be at a great many schools working out of a central board of education (BOE). Each school will treat you differently: I had friends who were tape recorders, and others who planned the entire curriculum. It's pot-luck really.

Where are you hoping to be placed? I was in Kumamoto prefecture on Kyushu and I strawberry floating loved it. 3 of the best years of my life.

Ah yeah, I did a weekend TEFL course with I-to-I so I know a few decent games. Could also throw in a few buzzwords like "student talk time" and such. I'm applying for Hyogo, hoping to be placed in Kobe but I'm not really fussed. Did you ask to be placed on Kyushu? It didn't even cross my mind to consider placements not on Honshu. Is it massively different from Honshu in any way? Other than hotter, obvs.

The only Japanese celeb I can think of is Hideo Kojima

Got a JET interview! Woo!

It's on Wednesday the 25th of January. Sweet.

aaronayl1 wrote:Got a JET interview! Woo!

It's on Wednesday the 25th of January. Sweet.

strawberry floating congratulations mate!!

Yeah, nice one!
I hope that we'll be getting something in the post soon.

Those of you applying for JET, are you doing it because you plan on going into teaching later in life or are you mainly interested in it for other things (for example improving your Japanese or just for the bants)?

Mainly for other things. Essentially it looks BOSS on the CV - showing you're willing to go outside your comfort zone in a number of areas etc, - and wanting to improve my Japanese. And also the money is good.

Money isn't as good as last year for new JETs though, since they've staggered the salary. But if you stay for 3 years it does work out that you're earning slightly more overall than last year's entrants would get from their 3 years. You probably knew already though, since reading about JET is somewhat of an obsession for most applicants.

John Galt wrote:Those of you applying for JET, are you doing it because you plan on going into teaching later in life or are you mainly interested in it for other things (for example improving your Japanese or just for the bants)?

Whatever happens with JET, I'm going to teach in Asia for a number of years. But that's still for the bants. When I get this urge to travel and banta out of my system I will settle down and do a Psychology MA.

Which Japanese learning iPhone apps would you guys recommend? The app store is full of them, but the ones I've tried for free haven't been too good.

So what does Ecchi Baka mean? I'm too scared to google it.

John Galt wrote:Those of you applying for JET, are you doing it because you plan on going into teaching later in life or are you mainly interested in it for other things (for example improving your Japanese or just for the bants)?

I'm going for the CIR position - not sure how much you know about that. Either way, it's not teaching, but more helping to build bridges and work directly with local councils and governments to help internationalise the local areas. For example, if I were to become CIR in a town where, for example, Pacman would be, then I would be helping him out with stuff as well. AFAIK.

On the application form, there was an option of Economic Exchange, which I'm willing, and very excited to hopefully do. Ultimately, working between Japan/UK is something I definitely want to do later. I am also definitely considering a long-term move to Japan in the future, and want to improve my Japanese more. Plus, I'm sure I can get some sort of bants on the go.

Archaeon wrote:So what does Ecchi Baka mean? I'm too scared to google it.

Ecchi is, AFAIK, used when something is erotic, or pervy, I guess. I think it originated from manga drawing styles/genres, but would need Staydead's confirmation (no troll). Think drawings of looking up a schoolgirl's skirt on the train, for example.

Baka just means stupid. Or silly. Or retarded. Or something implying lack of intelligence.

Put together, I can't quite imagine where you read/saw that.

Isn't Ecchi Baka Hentai a, um, thing in certain circles? Not that it would need the Baka bit, now that you tell me what it means

Archaeon wrote:Isn't Ecchi Baka Hentai a, um, thing in certain circles? Not that it would need the Baka bit, now that you tell me what it means

Using my dictionary, lol:

Ecchi(エッチ) is defined as indecent, lewd, frisky, sexy; to have sex. Apparently you can "do" ecchi, which is just to have sex. But I think that meaning has somewhat changed?

Baka is still stupid.

As you surely know, hentai (変態) means abnormality/pervert (lit. strange/unusual/change attitiude/appearance)

So yeah, unless you're being specific, you probably don't need to google it.

Baka is "stupid", "ecchi" rings a bell but only from the internet so it must be something perverted.

It's just one of those phrases I kept finding in all those 4ch*n screenshots when I was a Reddit regular. I obviously knew what Hentai is. I mean who doesn't?